Something New Entirely
by ur boy jack kennedy
Summary: Sherlock is seventeen brilliant, John is neither. Warnings for age difference.
1. Chapter 1

As it would happen, John's not chased many seventeen-year-olds around London. He's not shot too many cabbies for teenagers, and he hasn't had an adolescent roommate since cadets.

Truth be told, he doesn't really want to make a habit out of it.

It's the way people look when they sit down together. In a café, when hailing a cab. In public, whenever they're together. Sherlock's totally untouchable, he always has been, but they never look at him. The cold shoulder, the eyes of judgment, that's all on John. He's old enough to know better, should know better, does know better. But he doesn't want to know better. No, John will put up with the faces of disgust because he values something more.

Sherlock Holmes is seventeen. When John was that age, he was still in education, still keeping his head down, still living at home. He'd had a girlfriend, and a uniform, and an overbearing older sister. But Sherlock...he lived alone, sleuthing about crime scenes, making eyes at the Detective Inspector to get closer to corpses. The only normal thing sherlock had was his overprotective twenty-something brother. Both equally strange and other-worldly.

However strange it is, John must confess he finds it most endearing. For all of Sherlock's quirks and charms, he's something new entirely. It's refreshing, because nobody sees the world like Sherlock does. It's in the way he inspects people, in the way his hands move with such swift grace and dexterity. There's nobody else like it. When the boy talks, the walls lean in to listen. The world is stunned into silence, humbled.

With Sherlock, there's always more than one way of seeing something.

In the army, they'd all been the same. Everything they didn't like, didn't read or listen to was a waste of time, space and energy. Lads talked about football and girls. Football results and films. Football players and music. Football matches and food. But mainly football. Mostly football. And it had driven John to breaking point.

But with Sherlock, it was as if the world were a football. The boy could tell a player by the ankle if he set his mind on the matter. Nobody else in the world was like that.

So let them whisper and let them stare. It's all fine.

That is, until he stops thinking about Sherlock in a way. It's always been his mind for John. He almost forgets to consider that Sherlock's body is more than just transport. To the extent that he disregards it completely until he clears his head. Why shouldn't John have his cake and eat it? There's no law saying that Sherlock's brilliance must be paired without love for the body that sustains it.

Because, on all accounts, the man really is perfect.

John looks the other way for nearly three months until something drastic catches his attentions. He's watching television when it happens, the news. Half-asleep, John's drowsing, sailing through the minutes with lack of thought. Sherlock at this time is in the shower, taking it hot as the water can get. Steam chokes the entire floor. It's from the steam that John hears the footsteps: wet flesh on laminate, and he turns on the sofa to ask something. At the time it was important, but the words were robbed from his larynx.

Glowing and entirely nude, Sherlock dried his hair with a towel as he walked. Steam rose from his shoulders and lingered behind him like a ghostly companion. For seventeen, there was simply so much of him. Everywhere. And it was just so. All the while Sherlock walked, in his own little world, caught up in some deep thought, he didn't once seem to notice John. Whom, all that while, had forgotten to blink: that's how entranced he was.

The sudden feeling of besottedness wasn't entirely unexpected. I'll start at the start. Begin at the beginning. For that seems a sensible place.


	2. can you tell

At the start, there was nothing but dreams. The feverish sort that plagued John in his waking moments. He'd not dreamt of the desert, of the blood and sand and heat since recovery, since being alone in the hospital. At the time, he figured it was just a natural response to solace and trauma, but when he began to panic in his sleep at Baker Street, he knew he'd been wrong.

It was the same most nights. The desert sand was so dark, there was no telling where it met the sky. In the distance the gunnery rumbled, like some dull rumour of another war. Bullets strafed the air, and thick, ruddy puddles of rouge littered the sands, and John was alone under the moon. A child in his arms moaned, but there was nothing that could be done.

So John began to panic. Every time was different, for he tried and tried to top the bleeding, to stop the pain. But nothing happened. The crimson was all over his arms, drying like paint and John was sick, he felt unwell and would wretch, knowing that his attempts were wasted, pointless, and that he would surely die out there as every soldier before him and-

"John," Sherlock had a voice like the flickering of a rifle. It caused John great shock at the time, and he was for a small part grateful and for a large part unsure. He'd left part of himself in that desert. "You were talking in Punjab."

"I'm sorry," John muttered, sitting up, rubbing his eyes. "I didn't mean to wake you," And it was only than that it registered. Shirtless, a brilliant white in the darkness, Sherlock Holmes was seventeen and in his bed. They were far too close for it to be decent. Sherlock was touching him: shoulder-to-shoulder, in the bed, in John's bed. This strange, funny little creature was close to him. John knew barely anything of him. "It's alright," He stretched. "Go back to bed."

Sherlock yawned a little, mewling like a kitten, and rolled onto his side, the intricate bones of his shoulders jutting from within his nearly bluish skin.

"Sherlock, I'm seriou-"

"Position you sleep in, always on your side, arms always out, that suggests you're used to sleeping with a partner. Perhaps your sister as a child, perhaps a girlfriend as an adult. Either way, you've been alone since the war, and you're not used to sleeping alone. Makes the nightmares worse. Gives you that subliminal feeling of being..." He tasted the word, savouring it with his tongue, enjoying the feel of his judgement. "...alone,"

The worst part of it all is how right he was. Sherlock was seventeen, barely out of home, or education, and just from the way John slept, the way he dreamt, he could tell all of that. It was terrifying, and brilliant all at once.

Sherlock in his bed, however, was merely inappropriate.

"Yeah, well." John rubbed at his eyes. "You can go back to bed." But, as something horrible stirred in his stomach, something warm and sick like want, Sherlock made no attempt to move. Lord, John was a good man. He never broke the law and he had saved lives and respected people and helped them. He didn't deserve the stroke Sherlock would surely give him. "I'm serious, Sherlock-" The duvet was snatched from him, and Sherlock wriggled, getting comfortable and warm. "Sherlock!" John whispered, hotly.

"John." Sherlock met his gaze with the most dangerous, level eyes. The starlight made them silver, and he looked otherwordly and strange. How wrong it was that John didn't look away, he didn't even try. There was no point in arguing, really, because Sherlock was full of chemical imbalances and rage and love. The most stubborn of teenagers.

That was how John came to dream less, in the beginning. He'd wake, most mornings, to a bundle of dark curls at the end of his nose.

But when John stopped dreaming of the desert, he began dreaming of something else. 


	3. high treason

Sherlock Holmes should have come with some sort of guide.

He was an odd sort of gift, that's what John thought. There was no manual, no warranty, no instructions; and the terms of use weren't immediately clear. It was a gift, it seemed, that both gave and took away. Sherlock could give if you knew how to use him. How to set him up properly. But on his own, without the correct circumstances he could so easily slip, fall, lose his grasp on the good and plunge himself back into the darkness.

John would do whatever it took to stop that. Difficulty irrelevant, Sherlock Holmes was the greatest and wisest boy he'd ever met. What a waste it's be to have him die young, all alone somewhere in Hammersmith or wherever from an overdose. The thought was enough to make John get the milk.

There were rules, John thought, in the guide. Dos and Don'ts, social faux pas that would seem odd to anybody else. He was glad for that, it gave Sherlock a little bit of normalcy (but didn't detract from his brilliance, or his way of looking at things). The tricky bit was, of course, mapping out where the lines overlapped. At what point did sharing a bed with someone fifteen years or so older than you become fine? What was outlandish about asking about his orientation?

It would take years, John thought, to invent a correct social etiquette to use around Sherlock. He'd really only just started.

Which is why, in the middle of a London bank, in the middle of the day, John was surprised to be given an utterly obtuse cold shoulder. It really worried him, ate away at him because he wasn't sure what he'd done. John had a conscience, and a sort of rare sympathy for Sherlock. He wanted the injury to be excused, but he didn't know what the injury was, or how deep it had cut.

For the rest of the day Sherlock didn't talk an awful lot. He walked faster, hands thrust into his pockets, like he wanted to leave John behind. he couldn't, of course, because John kept up and kept quiet. Didn't want to aggravate the already apparent hostility. Didn't want to have to ask what the problem was. He felt he should know.

Do you ever think back, look back on a relationship or a day, and look for those early warning signs?

But as much as John wanted to figure it out, to fix things and get back on Sherlock's good side, he couldn't do it. Couldn't clock whatever he'd done to upset Sherlock. Part of him a small, irrational part of him suspected it to be adolescence. Stress of brilliance. Hormones. Perhaps something that wasn't John's the back of a cab, he gave up. "Sherlock." He said, in a weary sigh. They both knew what he meant.

"Colleague." Sherlock sniffed. Said the word like it meant nothing, was nothing, even after he'd used it. yes, Sherlock Holmes had known John for mere hours when he introduced John as his colleague. What was different? What made it such a crime?

"This is my friend," Sherlock had said, and there was this huge amount of pride behind his eyes. The banker-what was it, Sebastian?(twenty-something, had been at university with Sherlock or something similar)-he glanced over John with this strange sort of surprise. As if he didn't really believe it. Or want to. "John Watson," And John had seen Sherlock's chest swell with this strange sort of happiness. His eyes didn't leave the banker, like he was showing John off.

"Friend?" The mocking tone made the happiness that Sherlock had been hiding die. Burn out.

"Colleague." John had said, far too quickly.

Too quickly to realize that he'd sort of betrayed Sherlock. The boy was too young to understand how that made John look. How strange it was for other people to see them as friends. How wrong. The mistake was still there, the offence still stood. Seventeen and brilliant, untouchable, icy beyond his years. Of course Sherlock didn't have many people he could call friends.

Certainly not that poor girl at the morgue. She had such a fancy for him, the same sort of inappropriate one that Sherlock used to his advantage. Pulled the right cards, made the right sort of eyes at the right times. Nor that Inspector, the long-suffering gent who clearly had the same sympathies for Sherlock, always let him wander around, pulling orders on everybody. Always let him work the room. Definitely not his brother.

John let his head drop against the window. "Sorry," He said, and the guilt was clear on his face.

Sherlock nodded. A silent sort of forgiveness. 


	4. want of ages

John remembers being a teenager. He remembers being frustrated all the time. Winding up his parents, staying up late and being invincible.

And he remembers the lust.

They'd been sharing a bed for a comfortable amount of time when it happened. It was always going to end in disaster, just dependent on time. Ever since John had fired a shot through an open window, Sherlock seemed to trust him. Seemed to respect him. And Sherlock Holmes didn't respect anyone. He was almost always pulling commands at crime scenes, brushing off theories that were not his own. But he asked for John's input. He listened to it.

And if Sherlock was feeling that way (John could only speculate, he couldn't confirm), what would he do? Seventeen years isn't all that long for somebody to decide what kind of person they'll be. Or what kind of person they'll want. John knew what they thought. People who didn't know were in an easy position to judge. But ones who knew, who were invited to watch, they all said the same thing.

That John was good for him.

For a while, when they slept, that gave John some peace. To think that Sherlock didn't want him, wouldn't turn him into something awful. Of course, he would not have objected to Sherlock's affection, to his own strange brand of want (if, indeed, he ever had a brand available). But it certainly made him comfortable. John would always have settled for Sherlock's trust, above all things.

But he wasn't about to settle.

John crept off to bed first, wearied from running after Sherlock. Whom tramped a perpetual journey. Of course, John liked it, he liked that the dog days were over, but he was easily tired. Things weren't how they had once been and he'd never seen a gladder sight than his sheets.

Right away, he feel into a strange sort of half-sleep. Light enough that he felt unsatisfied but deep enough that he didn't clock when Sherlock had abandoned the waking world and slid in next to John. Sherlock was a funny little bird, for he seemed always so comfortable with the impressive length of himself. Graceful, even in his sleep. Even if he did keep muttering.

Hours later, he stirred to a wonderful feeling.

A warm, firm grip on his cock. The unmistakeable invitation for sex. The definite instigation for unrest. For pleasure. John was in no position to resist, half-asleep but awake enough to be enjoying himself. He didn't think, or protest, but flinched his hips, wanting friction, wanting a little more.

John groaned and pushed back with his hips. Settling into it. Feeling the want rise in him. Christ, it was a far cry from John's hand, from months of just going through the motions. Contact, this...it was almost shocking how much he needed it. The hand was soft and clever. The fingers played him like a cheap Spanish guitar, strings and all. Encouraged him.

He snapped open an eyes just as it was getting good, more fool him. Opened them wide, to see the instigator. To see a mess of dark curls, shining like feather in the light. To see Sherlock stark against the sheets, completely naked, and pleasuring a man over 15 years older than him with a hand.

"Christ!" John swore, and Sherlock suddenly looked panicked. As if he didn't know how wrong it was, as if he didn't know what he was subliminally asking John to become. He moved away, slapped Sherlock away, damn near ran back into the sheets, ashamed and astonished beyond his years.

Later, when they'd been silent for a while, Sherlock turned to John. Privately, intimately. A victim of his own times and frustrations. The teenagers appeared beneath his icy skin.

"Not good?" He asked, cold, completely removed. His pride was still ailing. John sighed.

"Not really,"

"I just-" Sherlock shook his head, unsatisfied, unhappy, and blew the hair from his face. "I just need-..." For underneath the weight of being brilliant, being a prodigy, lightyears in advance of thinking. Outside of his innate creativity and fantastical mind, he was the same as every other kid. Wanted to touch and be touched, wanted to break things and scream, to get high when he was low, just like every other kid.

Sherlock still looks pale. Put out.

"I'm not angry." John says, and it puts Sherlock at ease somewhat. As if, for that moment, he's settling for John's trust. 


	5. trap doors

For every bit that Sherlock was a ravenous, outlandish, lusty boy, he was a small part gentler, too. It was his more quite moments, more intimate glances and words more than anything else that drew John's eye. He did not, like most, search for the storm of rage in Sherlock. There was more in the whisper than the shout.

The thing was, and Sherlock knew it, that was why he worked the room for Lestrade, Sherlock could choose anybody to sleep with. He had the freedom to select, he was beautiful enough, intriguing and utterly spellbinding enough to get to pick. The only reason it was such an issue, was that this time Sherlock wanted to, and he wanted John. Nobody ever said 'no' to Sherlock Holmes.

But he couldn't fall apart, wind down in front of anybody else. He didn't trust them. No- it wasn't trust, it was pride. Who were others to pity him, mock him or berate him for his shortcomings, for being primarily human? John didn't pity Sherlock, he couldn't. No, there was frustration, and sometimes resentment, but mostly it was intrigue, and compassion, and fondness.

Privately, John thought that Sherlock might once have gone to Mycroft, looked up to him, leveled with him...laughed with him. Something had changed though, perhaps it was a word or a phrase or a picture, but Sherlock stopped admiring when Mycroft started pitying.

The whisper was private. Maybe Sherlock didn't realize he was doing it. Of course, when the storm came and tore through the room, when the shout split his ears, Sherlock knew what he was doing.

But after three months, the shout comes. And then the whisper.

It starts, as I might have mentioned, with Sherlock. For everything does. Fresh from the shower, and flushed like a fennel bud, he wanders through the living room quite peacefully, as if sailing. His hair is damp like straw, and a single rivulet is drawn down his spine. When John looks, though, he doesn't look at the rivulet but at the skin, a shock of white that soaks in the sun, that is damned near phosphorescent. It makes John want to touch, memorize every bone and hair. And he can see everything.

Sherlock's strut slows when he gets closer to the kitchen. He crouches slightly to fumble for something in the fridge. John doesn't know, he's too busy scolding himself, drowning in guilt and lust. He hasn't felt so electric and wanton since actually being seventeen (for he's not lived with many of them).

Sherlock struts out again, all hips, legs longer than John's full height or something near. He's brandishing a cold bottle of something, but John's more focused on Sherlock's lips as he drinks, in place of what he's drinking. It could be bottled mercury, John just doesn't want the visual to end. And Sherlock? Sherlock knows that John's staring. He looks up, once, fleetingly, and licks his lips, eyes dropping, continuing to walk, continuing to work the room.

John knows what he could do. Knows where Sherlock is, and what he'd have to do to have him. Sometimes he thinks about Sherlock before him, even younger, and it makes John quite ill. It's selfish, he knows, to want Sherlock all to himself, and it's wrong to want him anyway.

But nothing later, he's at a loss. It's dark, an orange sort of dark that looks brunt and acidic, the air tastes like it-might-rain and there's not nearly enough of it. He can't breath properly, the ghost in his lungs is choking him. First are the words, then are the people. All of which lead to the panic.

He's bound, trapped, fixed to a chair and the flames blink at him. There is no way out, he thinks, all he can see is guns and fire and darkness (the burnt kind, which casts the blackest of shadows). Beside him is a beautiful woman. She is also bound, the helplessness clear on her face. They both must look like children, lost and frightened.

John knows his fear, but knows better than to let it own him. He tries to take himself away, think on something other than the people, or the words, or the burning darkness. The uncertainty lingers, is pungent and the Sarah reeks of fear. Like anybody would, should do. people know better than to attempt bravery.

John takes himself away to Sherlock Holmes, for that's all they can talk about. Thinks about the skin as wintry cream, his hard eyes and the lips that suggested a smile, wrote paragraphs of subtext on laughter. But never attempted such things. John can't help but steel himself, just for a second, and there against the burnt darkness, he fancies seeing that boy.

The hallucination glows bright against the burning and is completely nude, soft and snowy. John's fear withers at the sight and for a second he's comforted, pleased by the sight before him. Lets the illusion be for a while.

There's blood on his temple. It's hot and an alarming sort of dry. The words are still there, haunting, rather than participating in his conscious stream of thought. He's not trying to be nonchalant, he's trying to clear his head.

"I'm not Sherlock Holmes," He has to confirm it. When John looks up, the illusion is gone and his fear grows once again, binds him harder against the chair than any rope ever could.

But they do not believe him, and his fear begins to grow. Sweat begins to form a necklace around his collar. The woman is cast in shadow, and all she does is speak, recall facts and her power seems to grow. The shadows flicker grotesquely. What should look like a woman cast again the wall looks like a great beast, edging forward, jaws pried open.

John recognises the streamline of her pistol. Recognises that he might certainly die. In that second, he allows his fear to own him. She talks again, serious, unkind. Cocks the gun and puts a finger to the trigger. Places the gun at his temple. The bloody one.

His fear talks of death. John's death. The sulphurous atmosphere do no instil courage, and John thinks that he doesn't want to die there. Perhaps he's too vain for that fate, it's unclear. As she begins to pull back he sees his death, looks eye-to-eye with it and his mind wanders.

John does not once think of Sarah. He thinks of Sherlock, and for a second, is angry. but, in death, John can only conclude that he's glad to have met him, laughed with him, grown fond of him in a strange, intimate way. He's glad to have found the whisper.

He looks at the barrel of the gun. His heart thrums. A painted nail catches the light.

But nothing 's fear dies away at the hollow click and he makes a pained sort of noise, somewhere between extreme relief and frustration. He isn't frustrated. He's alive.

Eventually, his breathing evens out and John can feel his heart racing and his lungs emptying and he marvels that he can live like this, so dependent on death's entertainment, yet so unwilling to die.

She reloads the gun. A full magazine. And John thinks that he's ducked one too many times. That he'll die here after all, and Sherlock will find him lying in his own blood, mouth open, flies at rest on his forehead.

She keeps talking, likes the sound of her own voice, but John looks down. There's a whole where something was: John will put up with alot, but his pride rejects that fate. He wants to bargain with her.

"Do you have it?" She asks.

"Have what?"

"The treasure." He wishes he knew. Wishes he really was Sherlock Holmes and could be brilliant and young and beautiful and able to cheat death, cheat conformity. Live life like it were a desire path. John's exasperated.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"We would prefer to make certain." A sheet is pulled and reveals a familiar contraptions. An arrow's head blinks at him, hungry, sharp. But it's pointed to her. In all of his illusions and thoughts, John feels guilty for not thinking about her more. Sarah is a beautiful woman, she does not deserve to die here.

When the ultimatum is set, she looks around, sort of helpless, shiny-eyed. John knows those eyes. Seen them on countless young men. The acknowledgement of death. It does not become her, and he wants to erase the mark it leaves. But John is powerless. His fear binds him, chokes him and he's never felt so alive, and so dead all at once.

He turns desperately, whispering, listening to her struggle. 'I'm sorry', like it's a prayer. Like the words have a use. She sobs, lightly, struggles and sees her own fear, her own death. Sarah isn't like John (and she doesn't hold a roman candle to Sherlock Holmes), she's already property of fear.

The gun is put to John again. And the panic rises.

"I'm not Sherlock Holmes, you have to believe me." He wants to end everything, to open his eyes and see a pale body next to him, still asleep, untouched by this waking nightmare."I haven't found whatever it is you're looking for."

"I need a volunteer, from the audience." Sarah begins to weep, her cried become louder and louder. Every breath screams that she is too young to die. "Ah, thank you, lady," She mocks, and Sarah is struggling now,shaking, desperate to free herself. Death locks eyes with her. "You'll do very nicely."

Sand scatters from the burlap sack. All eyes are ice.

"We present, for your viewing pleasure, Sherlock Holmes' pretty companion in a death-defying act."

"Please!" John interjects. It's his fault, all of it, and his heart is screaming, blood singing with desperation.

"You've seen the act before, how dull for you." A single black lotus flower is placed in Sarah's lap. "You know how it ends."

"I'm not Sherlock Holmes!" He screams, raw with fury and fear and a bitter taste that seems like love but it completely different.

"I don't believe you."

"You should, you know." And John nearly weeps in , his saviour, his favourite obsession, there in the light, the shadow of a skinny, slight seventeen-year-old. He sounds fierce and dauntless. John looks, forgets all about death and fear and Sarah and sees Sherlock looking tall and beautiful, there in his greatcoat. It has to be real, it has to be him there,saying those things.

The woman turns quickly, cocking her gun, aiming it where Sherlock had been seconds ago. He's playing with her. Teasing at the entire operation set up. Stalling. John's still bound, still bleeding, still close to death. Sarah is still eye-to-eye with her fear.

"How would you describe me, John?" Sherlock must be joking. His vanity always does this, runs away with itself, hand-in-hand. The familiarity of it almost comforts John. It's like they're home, for a second. He remembers to breath, heavy and so relieved he could faint.

"Resourceful? Dynamic? Enigmatic?" All choice words, John thinks, but he discards them. In place of words like truculent, loquacious, imperious and broken.

But John can't think straight, for his fear is still lingering, still loosely tied around his neck like a noose. And while Sherlock will save him, there's little room for doubt, a part of John thinks that Sherlock will be kicking the chair from beneath him.

"Late?" He breathes. It's meant half in jest. He looks at Sarah for a second, drowns in guilt.

"That's a semi-automatic." Sherlock begins. "If you fire the bullet will travel at over 100 metres per second." John's stopped listening. He's watching the sand cascade down. thinking about time, and hearing it tick away. How long does she have left?

"Well?"

"Well," There's a vicious whack and John spies a distant figure, some boy, thin as a dime, thumping a barrel-chested man. It sounds like a lead pipe. "The radius curvature of these walls is nearly four metres. If you miss the bullet will ricochet. Could hit anyone." he waits a beat for the punchline. "Could even bounce off the tunnel and hit you."

The footsteps are audible too late, and Sherlock's face, bright and young, appears fleetingly above the flames before they dim, dissapear. The general looks about helplessly in the burnt darkness.

Behind Sarah, he appears, far too narrow, a child but for a few years, unlacing the bonds that hold her. She glances behind her, looking away from her death, her fear. But his hands are not fast enough, and a ribbon slices the air, catches around his pretty little neck and chokes him.

Sherlock grunt in pain, rising, pulling desperately at the fabric that chokes him. And in the cracked darkness John is genuinely terrified, at a loss for what to do because he can do nothing but watch. Death mocks him, dangling Sherlock there like a plaything. He fights like any boy would.

Sarah watches on, sometimes at John, with soaking eyes. The reflection of the fire burns bright within them, but she's not fierce or arrogant or broken. She's not like him, not a miracle or a hero, not a strange or precious thing. She's just a woman.

Behind her, the red flashed against the black. John is unsure who to help, or even if he can, but musters his strength and shuffles, awkwardly, up to stand. He walks, bound, as fast as he can. The fight continues. Sarah looks on. Hurrying now, sick with grief, John edges forward.

He falls before the ballista. Watches as the weight descends slowly. It's not enough to watch. Panic fills him. John wriggles, kicking for a better angle. Drags the chair and searches in the orange. Sherlock chokes. Sarah stares. The air is acid around them.

A strange look enters her eyes. Sarah looks as if she is ready to die. Behind her, Sherlock fights.

John kicks out as the weight lowers. He shuts his eyes, hearing the air slice and the sound of contact. White noise fills his ears. Everything is over. Sherlock's assailant topples over into the darkness, a large, feather arrow through his chest. There is little blood. There is little to grieve resumes breathing, taking in great gulps of air, shedding the great red bind. He stands, unsteadily, nose red and face aghast, and it's there, in the gladness, in his eyes. The whisper. John looks on with utter besottment. He turns, checking the darkness, and finds safety.

Turns back to the weeping.

"It's alright," He says, and sounds so human, so soft. He'd gentle, so careful and John disregards his guilt, just watches. "You're going to be alright. It's over now," Her hands are freed, but Sarah does not move. She stared at where her death had been. She sobs.

Perhaps she cries because it's over. It's safe. He runs his hands up her arms, soothing, unlike anything John has previously recognised. Liberally, she weeps. John's heart clenches, is steamed and boiled, slippery in his chest.

"Don't worry," He says, light-hearted, "Next date won't be like this."

Sherlock catches John's eyes very briefly and he looks strange. Relieved,, but conflicted. As if he does not recognise John. He looks back again, and puts his hand high on Sarah's back.

They're safe.

John does not speak, cannot find words until Baker Street. He's more conflicted than Sherlock, he thinks, by a thousand miles. Feels rage and love, and guilt and regret, and gladness and sorrow. As soon as the door is closed, as soon as Sherlock begins to unravel his scarf, something funny happens to John.

He just breaks.

"Where the hell were you?" He asks suddenly, voice strained with abivilance. "I thought I was going to do, I thought she was dead -I can't do that again, Sherlock, you nearly had us killed-"

The whisper comes again in a physical way. Appears like a ship along the morning horizon. Blotted by fog, but still visible.

Sherlock sort of hisses, very slightly, and grabs John, pressing their faces together, aligning their lips clumsily. His infinite arms lock around John, wrapping him inside Sherlock's coat, shocking him by the suddenly intimacy. It would be ridiculous if it wasn't shocking.

It occurs to him then, that Sherlock is scared. He's breathing too loudly to be fine, at peace, calm. Had he thought John dead? John doesn't want to picture Sherlock fearing anything, prefers this unattainable state of calm haughtiness that he sees in Sherlock.

after pulling away Sherlock exhales and looks to the round, turns away like he's disappointed John. Like he's been sent to his room.

"Sherlock?" John catches him with a single word. The eyes flick up, tired, full of fragility. "Thank you."

Later, in bed, Sherlock curls right up next to John. Furrows deep into the covers and clings to John with a strange sort of affection. John smiles, weary, and presses his nose into the nest of dark curls. He wants Sherlock like this: every bit as human as anyone else, not flash of wit or cruel words. The quiet sort of brilliance.

In the corner of the room, John sees the thought of Sherlock naked. He leans against the door-frame and drinks from his bottle.

And John lets the illusion be. 


	6. defiance

How did Sherlock Holmes end up in John Watson's bed? He fell, of course.

To begin at the beginning is some hours before. The morning is still and uneasy, the air tastes like salt and steam, like overcast-with-a-chance-of-storm. For once, there is some sort of silence. The insane mishmash of yells and traffic is far off and faded, birdsong is muffled and comforting. No small wars, to begin with.

The peace is appreciated in the form of sleep. Heavy limbed, heavy head, John Watson believed he'd every right to sleep, to rest, to work up his strength. For he knew, undoubtedly when he woke, Sherlock Holmes would be off, tramping his perpetual journey, burning down cities but never feeling anything.

He thinks of Sherlock in his dreams occasionally. Sometimes. Often. Always. The things is, Sherlock's so huge to comprehend, skinny little boy, mad as a hatter, thin as dime, this tiny charming man is simply enormous. Everything he does, or says or alludes to with his behaviour, it's almost impossible not to be enamoured. John wants to catalogue all of it, memorize, to understand. Perhaps he never will, but it will take a lifetime to find out, and he's ready for that.

Prepared to study, and to watch. But he's not prepared for everything.

It's never what he'd envisaged as a teenager, as a child. As a soldier. he's still a soldier in many ways, still stands to attention when he's shouted at, still keeps his shoes clean, still keeps his gun, knows how to fire. But Sherlock has changed the order of things. Messed it all up. At this age, John is supposed to be married, working. Living life in a linear fashion. No, instead he's joined Sherlock on the perpetual journey, he's falling for some kid, and God help him, John isn't a soldier anymore, he's happier than he's been in years.

No, John's not a soldier. When they first met, his hair was short and the colour of ditchwater, of starlight, silver as the grass at night. It's longer now, and needs a cut. He thinks, ridiculously, tragically, that he should keep track of every haircut. It makes him wonder id he'll see Sherlock's hair grow from root to tip, if he'll see it grey and thin. The thought is perhaps more comforting than it should be.

He's woken by a critical pinch to the ribs.

"John," It's a low grumble, one that he knows, has heard so any times, and thinks about the feel of it against his lips, the feeling not dissimilar to the violin's tremolo. But he's not awake yet. Annoyed, Sherlock huffs and reaches into the duvet, administering a savage poke."What?" John's head hurts, is still thrumming, and he thinks he's spent too much time thinking, having silent crises and staring at the thought of Sherlock naked. He rolls onto his side, and sees Sherlock, in the nude but for boxers, hair fluffy and chaotic and he thinks that he ought to kiss Sherlock, he could and he can and he might just, because for everything, they've only kissed once, and that doesn't make an awful lot of sense.

But he doesn't kiss Sherlock.

They stare fr the longest while, existing outside of silence and noise, time and purpose. Sherlock wants something, John knows it because they're never like this, he's never like this. Sherlock is brilliant and furious and wanton and cold, but when he's quiet like this he wants.

That's when they kiss. Well, John lays there frozen in thought, lost in things to say or not to say, lost in the way Sherlock is such a beautiful creature, so soft and cold, so lonely and fragile.

Sherlock kisses with fervour, with vigour, revealing his desperate want, showing himself to be seventeen and a blizzard of angst and hatred, hungry for feels guilty, he'll always feel guilty, because Sherlock is so young, and he deserves more. As if to want John would be selling himself short.

He doesn't just kiss, either. There's hands. there wants of something unsavoury, something more, and John wants it, too, Christ, he wants to see Sherlock's face red with orgasm, see the stars when his eyes are closed too tightly, and with Sherlock he'd see the whole cosmos.

Sherlock's mouth is sly, and he begins with his hands. Fiddle with John's clothes, running through his hair. He's making these gorgeous little sounds, moans and whimpers and John can't help but wonder what he'd sound like getting sucked off. He cups Sherlock's sides and looks up, looks at something so ungodly and his ministrations stop, all at once.

It has to wait. Wait until Sherlock isn't so young, and John is more fearless.

"No," John says, quietly, but Sherlock goes on. His words fall on deaf ears. "Sherlock, no, we-" He sighs in frustration, because it's not what he wants, to stop, not what any of them would like, but that's how it needs to be. "I should really..." Of course, Sherlock does not look at all grateful. he looks furious, ashamed, embarrassed. Most of all, he looks human.

"Don't be angry, Sherlock, you don't want-"

"You don't know what I want!" He snaps, not cold anymore, not distant or level but just hurt and angry. Just like any other teenager. "You don't know me." John shakes his head.

"I'm going out," John sighs, resigning, unwilling to continue the argument. He knows he can never win, because Sherlock is Sherlock, too clever for his own good, too ignorant to voice his feelings properly.

"Fine," Sherlock says, and all of a sudden he's that way again, just the look he's giving John is enough to make John want to go and put a jumper on. "It's nothing a rub wont fix," He makes the words sharp and vicious, cutting like a blade's edge and it hurts.

The words are followed by an unconscious swallow. John leaves, as he said

Sherlock wanders about the city in John's absence. Looks for trouble, leaves his coat in the flat and just walks. Does his best not to think about John, but there's something wrong without him. It's no good being clever if John isn't there, telling him so, looking at him with this ridiculous impressed smile. Sherlock checks his phone twice, but there's nothing there.

He takes a cab to Camberwell and sits on his father's grave, just thinking. It's not always about John, or his father. But mostly. And for the first time he thinks perhaps he shouldn't have left home, should not have gone so early. He reads over the inscription and blink at it. It's not as if he remembers in clarity.

The rain starts, a northern downpour, as he leaves the cemetery, hands jammed in his trouser pockets. Of course, his shirt goes seer and clings to him for the rain, and Sherlock feels feverish in the cold, as is the rain evaporates when it hits is skin, it's far too hot.

He walks for a silent eternity until he find a main road. His hands are numb, cold, metallic with veins when he pays the driver and slouches in the back, his face his warm and he feels faint, like a vapour, a column of smoke in a shirt.

As soon as he's in Baker Street he falls onto the sofa, and passes out. But John doesn't find him until some hours later.

As he'd said, John leaves early in the day to get some air, to resist the temptation of touching Sherlock. He wastes an hour shopping, gets a coffee at one of the costas in town and dithers, generally.

Internally, it's a battleground. John's been in wars before, but he's no idea how to move forward in this one. It's calamity on every part, because he wants Sherlock and he knows he's wanted back: but it's not just that innocent kind of symbiosis, it's sexual, and it's wrong and sick, because Sherlock is still just a boy, just a kid.

and while the internal battles rages,a monstrous black car pulls up, crawling next to the curb, next to John. And at first, he turns a blind eye. Ignores it. But the door swings open and he wants to cry out, it's simply not fair to have one Holmes: Sherlock is bad enough. Mycroft is bad in a different way. A potentially more dangerous way. A twenty-something is running Britain.

"Hullo, John," He says, bright and warm, comfortable against the leather upholstery. John sighs, he'd rather skip the threats and just get on with it. There's no avoiding him, Mycroft is omniscient. Taking up the seat furthest from Mycroft, John sits uselessly, keeping quiet. "I may call you John, mayn't I?""You see, John, I quite like you," John's brows meet his hairline. He looks about nervously, hoping for an explanation. "You're good for him. Of all the friends-" Mycroft tastes the words, mocks Sherlock with it. "-he's ever made, goodness is not a trait they share."

John shifts in his seat. He doesn't really want to hear a story.

"There were a few." Mycroft says, pursing his lips. "For a time, there was Victor. Nice enough. Had a cocaine addiction." He folds his hands in his lap. "Didn't last long. After that, of course, was Sebastian, but he didn't last very long. Nor did Kieran. Funny little welsh boy. I never did know what he saw in him."

"I don't see-" John began.

"Almost inspector Lestrade, too. But you're the only good man. The only one that doesn't...hurt him." He looks up at John with this funny little expression. Like great amusement.

"That's nice," John says, slightly annoyed. This doesn't include anybody else, it's inappropriate to have Mycroft know.

"All I'm saying is that he's very mature. At least, in that aspect. You shouldn't feel guilty for giving him something he undoubtedly wants-

"Don't," John interrupts, and his voice is thick with conflict and turmoil. Burns bright like kerosene, John has to burn bright or Sherlock will freeze up and curl up and dissolve into the air that tastes like salt-iron-and-rain. There's still no storm. "I don't care how mature he is. He's seventeen."

Mycroft looks as if he's heard a hilarious joke. A smile tugs at the corner of his lips, and he looks down, smiling in jest. "How old were you then, John?"

"I was-" He goes to answer, but stops. The battle continues to rage inside, but both sides are winning and loosing in different ways. John remembers, the memory still as bizarre and beautiful as he remembers it: a beautiful girl in a hotel. There was noting to it, he was sixteen and thought he'd found love and happiness, for he was immature, didn't know. The world still turned, and turned a lot darker. He has nothing left to say, and he really hopes Mycroft doesn't, either.

The car brakes to stop and John's door is opened.

"Good afternoon, John," Mycroft says, smiles at John as if he's heard a completely different conversation. "I hope to see you soon John," And John walks away mutely, doesn't really want to Mycroft again ever. I mean, John's certain he can be pleasant. Amiable. Affable. But mostly, he's terrifying.

He returns to a flat as quiet as the morning, and something snakes around his heart and chokes it. Christ, he thinks, it's not that he doesn't want Sherlock, it's just that he can't have him. Not yet, anyway.

As it turns out, Sherlock is half-awake on the sofa, still soaking from the rain he'd caught earlier, feverish, ill. He looks about when John comes in, tired to look nonplussed but fails. All John sees is a sick child.

"Come on," He says to Sherlock, who looks the other way. But that doesn't stop John. He lifts Sherlock up and over his should like a burlap sack and carries him into the bedroom. Stands him by the bed, into which Sherlock falls.

How did Sherlock Holmes end up in John Watson's bed? He fell, of course. 


	7. red rabbits

When he comes to, Sherlock's throat is dry, as if the notion of words has long since dried up, evaporated with fever, eloped with the rain. He was dreaming, and he hates dreams, he knows that some things linger in the back of his mind, unable to be deleted, painful stab wounds of the past. Sherlock thinks they're less like memories, less like dreams and more like scars. The notion is painful, awful and he wants to sob.

He never did, in earnest, and that makes everything seem a little less real. Less painful. What would it have solved? Tears never changed Mycroft's mind, never unsettled his hand. It would have made it worse, made him seem even more pathetic, stoked the very fire burning him. Out of everything, the cold and the shouts and the whispers and the fever of fights, Sherlock still has his pride. Wears it like a locket, but knows it will be his noose. his executioner.

The smell of the air had not been deceptive. Outside, a storm rages, with all the colour and fury of Sherlock's youth. Thunder cracks outside of the glass like the shout of a decent man mad. It is not the heat, as some say, in which the mad blood stirs. Sherlock has seen storms before, knows they are catalysts for bad decisions.

He coughs, throat still as dry. For the most part, Sherlock feels cooler, notices the chill coming from the storm. It's a cold storm, he notices, the ones that tear through distant highstreets, one that makes you feel warm in snow compared. On the bedside cabinet, there lies a lonesome cup of tea, and Sherlock goes to drink it. It's strong but cold. It's been there a while.

"John-?" It climbs up his throat and out of his mouth before Sherlock can think to object, flows as instinctively as calling for a parent in the night. The thought leaves a nasty taste on his tongue, and Sherlock coughs again.

Of course, he's always had John's name in his heart, and a curse for London, for it's inhabitants and his mindset, they've always co-existed. Sherlock doesn't know how one got out, or if they'll all follow.

He hears a shuffle, and John appears at his door, looking concerned but angry in the way that only good men can be, really, truly decent human beings.

"Where did you go?" John asks it like he's furious, and Sherlock is tempted not to answer him, to remain looking pitiful and cough and burst into tears. He's learnt from the best, it's impossible for good men to shout at you if you're crying. But only good men.

"I went for a walk." Striving for a colder tone, Sherlock knows he's already lost, and sounds really quite ill. He doesn't want to be doctored or mothered or looked after. He's managed most of his life as an island, in a way, because after his mother was left alone, he left her alone, and Mycroft changed, he started taking things. "You didn't seem to mind,"

John looks like guilt, looks as if he's broken something beautiful, and he's killed men in cold blood, why does he feel guilty over Sherlock? Perhaps one day he'll drown in his odd convictions.

"I had a run-in with your brother," John whispers the words, mutters them into his collarbone like they don't matter, because he wants to change the subject, wants Sherlock to stop looking at him with those angry-red-rimmed eyes. Mercy might be blue, but there's nothing merciful there, there's a cold storm in them, and John would be warmer outside, wearing nothing in snow then in Sherlock's sight.

"Stay away from him," Sherlock hisses, steadying himself on the bedside cabinet. Instinctively, John leans back, moves away to give the boy space (because he's decided that's what Sherlock is, even if you looked through a broken kaleidoscope and saw a million different versions of him scattered, they'd all be so young. So young but so brittle, in that awkward phase between child and man, grasping at the straws of both). "I don't want him near you, John, he's-" Which triggers a frenzy of soupy takes his cheek, rouge and creased in obvious pain. "You're feverish, Sherlock," His voice sounds still as water beneath bridges, sounds as smooth as sand on the rocks and Sherlock wants to drown in the sound, bathe in the cool green. He's tired, perhaps too much so to play bitter.

"Don't," He snaps, throat tight, each breathing wheezing and screaming. if he could, Sherlock would climb to the top of his feet and cream until each breath was dying, until his lungs felt as if they were ablaze, but his heart feels too boiled in his chest and a dizziness, a fever keeps him from doing so.

"You're sick, you need-"

"I don't need anything." Sherlock feels his stomach lurch. John shouldn't stand there like he does and say things like that, he doesn't know Sherlock, he's got no right, but he does and it's unnerving because it matters. It's minuscule, tiny, it shouldn't matter but it does, and that's what scares Sherlock more than the cold storm of a good man. "I don't need you. I managed fine on my own before!"

John feels small, tiny, as if he's half of a man and makes his way to the back of the room, away from the thunder of Sherlock shouting. Sherlock isn't good or decent, and a fire in his blood could burn down London, incinerate everyone and John will do anything just to put those flames out.

"Sherlock," He tried again, tries harder, tries better and softer to be granted an audience.

The boy in question is laying back down, face pink, hands over his eyes. Rubbing them. He mumbles something softly,throwing the words away, but John hears them, and it takes him back to being a child, rubbing his eyes after crying and doing the same. Thinking the same.

Once upon a time he's rub his eyes and say "Do you see the stars?" For, there they were, alive, burning bright as diamonds in his mind.

"Just-..," Sherlock never sounds like that, never has done. Like there are too many secrets in his mouth, too many scars and he isn't so sure of himself, so imperious anymore. It's horrible. "...let me sleep," There is John's little victory, because at least it will calm the fire, calm Sherlock down into some kind of reasonableness.

He turns to go, knows the moment is private. The stars don't belong in John's sky, in the night sky, they glow in the back of Sherlock's head, and John wonders if the stars were anywhere near as bright or beautiful as Sherlock the earth would fall in love, become enamoured with the night sky.

"I'll put the kettle on," John says, and he's nearly gone from beneath Sherlock's sky when he hears a tiny voice.

"John-..." and in that moment, no cold storm or hot storm or fire borne of blood, forged of malice could tear down the infinite, boundless, limitless night sky beyond Sherlock's eyelids which talk of red rabbits and sea legs and the heat of Australia.

Later, Sherlock wakes in the late night.

He thinks he's seeing rabbits, there tiny little things all made up in pinstripe. They talk amongst themselves, chatter, and Sherlock sees stars above them, doesn't understand hope they've come to settle on the bedroom floor in Baker Street. Sherlock sits up, and his wheezing is loud so that they turn at him and stare. They laugh.

"Why-?" He goes to ask, frightened, shocked, but begins to cough, and the rabbits get closer, continue to laugh in their pinstripe, and Sherlock knows that colour, has seen it before and closes his eyes but they never leave, the stars have begun to haunt his consciousness.

In the dark, he calls for help. "John!"

And a voice is at his side in a moment. The stars fizzle out and the rabbits burrow away, sink into the wood of the floor. There's no more mockery, no more laughter. There's just darkness. Found behind eyes, found in the night of Baker Street, and he feels arms around him, like seatbelts that save him from the strange, darker things that lurk within himself.

He goes on to sleep peacefully, and dreams of John, gorgeous John, brave John, clever and so much more than ordinary John whose worth is unmeasurable, whose value is not crass like coins or notes. Sherlock values him above all things, before all things and the arms around him do not move, shelter him from the storm that is dying outside.

He wakes again to a kiss on his molten eyes.

"I have work in an hour," It's John, it's always John that wakes Sherlock with a kiss. it may not have always been like that but always is silly and Sherlock doesn't care for it, frankly.

"You can't," He reasons, "You're sick," And John laughs, golden and from his belly.

"No, you're sick. I'm broke-" But John doesn't ever finish the end of that thought, disregards it completely to hear Sherlock cough, and then speak.

"Stay." And it's said with utter conviction, utter strength and force that shouldn't belong to someone so young, but John feels that tug, that dark desire to obey, to do right by Sherlock.

So he does. And gets to see the stars one more time. 


	8. a grimacing smile

"Tell me something about yourself." The darkness is heavy like sand, and warm like the sun had boiled it into glass. "Tell me something about yourself that nobody else knows,"

John asks because he's always been a paper boy, flimsy, frail. Colour him in, tear him in half sort of paper boy. He doesn't know anything about boys made of plastic, or marble like Sherlock. Marble because he's cold and white, because he's unbreakable and iconic and breathtaking. John is a paper man but he dreams of bigger and better things, dreams of marble when he isn't even chalk, when he's spent a lifetime being torn up, scrunched up and written on.

Sherlock frowns, deep set lines on the marble of his face, casting distorted shadows across his temples. They flicker in the early morning of moment that shouldn't be. It shouldn't be but there it is, and though his uncertain eyes John's love is made afraid. It's a perfectly reasonable request.

Sherlock doesn't answer straight away, not for lack of response. Simply because he doesn't know where to begin. He looks over, trying to feign sickness and escape the demand. But John's a doctor, and he's not convinced. Makes eyes like it really matters.

"I hate jelly," he says, tiring got seem casual. It's true, and he's sure that nobody else knows it. A satisfactory answer. Only, John doesn't give up, keeps clawing at the bricks that Sherlock's built up in a wall. It's safer, better to build fences and separate from the rest of the world, from the paper people. Even on some level, Sherlock knows it's true about John.

In all the time they've known eachother, shared a bed and longed pined until it brunt them up into ashes and smoke, a few bricks in the wall have come down. John can peer through, a paper by scratching his paper hands on the bricks of Sherlock's fence.

"Come on," John says, lighter than air. It makes Sherlock nervous, sick, his heart feels pliant and strange, as if in the grip of a fist. He coughs.

"I don't feel well," He says, lips a sinful kind of pink, and Christ, he's such a prima donna, knows how to get what he wants, get out of what he doesn't like. Sherlock rolls over, breath heavy, as if actually feverish. "I need to sleep," Adding pathetically, he yawns, "We can talk about it some other time,"

And John's so close to being sold, to rolling over and taking it like everybody else does when he sort of break again, and even though he's just paper he can't help but think it's not his job to bend to Sherlock's will. He's tried of being trodden on, the paper of his form is muddy and torn.

"No," He says, slowly, carefully. Sherlock bites his lip to stop from letting anything slip. All of those secrets, all of those "No, we can talk about it now," It's a freezing sort of truth, hurts like frost, stings like sour candy. They both look at eachother, through the gap in the bricks and Sherlock wants to turn away, doesn't want to be here, now, because he knows what John is going to ask, and he'll have to think back, remember. He'll have to mourn.

"John-" Sherlock says, he protests and turns ugly, but John catches his hand. Looks at him through the bricks, a tragic sort of hero, a sad character that Sherlock finds utterly disarming. They stare for a while and Sherlock knows what he wants, he always has, has always liked how John shyly places his eyes on him.

Did he ever know Sherlock had his eyes on John too?

"Please," John said, acting like Sherlock, feigning distress, agony at not having his way and Sherlock looks on, tears down his wall and sort of falls right for John. He's a torrent, a black hole of rage and love and compassion and sociopolitics. It's difficult, but he wants it more than he should.

"Fine," He says. For once, he loses. And John's overwhelmed, because he needs a victory, and this is it, crashing over him in a wave of silence. Sherlock still looks unwell and tired, and yet so encapsulating. London's history of summer has no such flower, neither has the bloody deserts room is sand, gritty, hard. John doesn't know how he's slept here, it's warm like the Afghan nights and just as salty, as sulphurous, the taste of blood-and-storm in the air. Of course, John's not John as he once was, doesn't talk with lads, or speed glum heroes up the line to death. He sees through Sherlock's eyes, like the window to another reality.

John's standing on his tiptoes, peeking through to something vast and beautiful, and it's so high. Better, he thinks, to see the view on the fall that never see it at all. Or was it like Harry always said? The higher the climb the more lethal the fall; that it was never worth it.

He feels guilty to have Sherlock laying there like he does, like he's keeping Sherlock against his will. It's not that case, Sherlock points it out often. "You think you're keeping me captive?" John was his saviour. "I was like a bird in a golden cage," And by freeing him, John had captured his heart.

Captured it and soiled it when he asked what was always there. That suspicion. That desire to know, to intrude. It makes Sherlock cringe. "What happened between you and Mycroft?"

Sherlock cannot say no: he's not a hypocrite, an the past will not haunt him. He casts away the spectres at the back of his mind. He begins.

"Lestrade," He says, throat stiff. "He was-" And it's overwhelming, he nearly wretches at the memory, stagnant and horrible in his mind. It takes him back t being fifteen or so, run away from home, living in an abandoned, Victorian estate. There were seven other boys, all under 25. All seeking cocaine, the little white lines that drove them, span their vision, quickened their hearts.

"I was fifteen," He says, quietly, never chancing a look at John. "Trying to kick the habit. Mycroft was-" Where had he been? Watching: laughing? "..-gone. Lestrade gave me cases, helped me get off -well, nearly get clean. I got to three weeks before he..." he laughs then, mirthless, humourless. It's dark, hurts him. "He lost interest. Met Mycroft. And I sort of gave up." John's silent, deadly, watching with serious eyes, watching the bricks come down at hiss paper feet.

"It used to give me nightmares." Sherlock continues. "The cocaine. I dreamt that I was eight-years old, in the forest and I couldn't find my way back." There are no bricks left. He lays there, frowning, looking a little more human with every sentence. John wants to shelter him from the world, from the horrors that be, but he doesn't. It's too late. Sherlock eyes are pained, have seen too much they didn't want to see.

He swallows, vulnerable. No fight left in him. "I've never told anyone that before." And John feels so limitless. He looks on, pained and enamoured and just there. He's not just anyone anymore. He knows Sherlock. They're close. It's beyond insane, and he's certain the moment will fade, slip through his fingers like liquid sunshine.

John kisses him with fervour, deep and true and there are no traces of that broken boy. He's marble and stone, not of paper or plastic. Dips his head, watches Sherlock's eyes widen.

"Is this what you wanted?" He asked, very quietly, and the boy nods, mutely, dumbly. "Good."

And John begins. 


	9. quid pro quo

"John...-" Sherlock's voice shakes so violently when John dips his head, pulls down Sherlock's underwear and begins. Of course, he irons out the uncertainty, but there still lingers a wantonness, something that he's kept up inside for a long time, something that his hand wont fix. He wants John, he really wants him.

And John's done this a million times, he's good. Sherlock knows it for certain, is whimpering it as John works his lips around the shaft, warming him up. And Christ, Sherlock can't, he's never had this before, it's never felt like this and he might just lose it by looking at John's face. John's face around his cock. It's nearly too much.

John takes all of him, swallowing around the hot, excited skin and hearing Sherlock wail, throwing his head back, squeezing his eyes shut so tight that the stars are almost falling from them. It's ridiculous, John thinks, that he gets this kind of reaction out of just a blowjob, it makes him almost wants to do other things.

Christ, his pupils are blown and he thrashes at John's every move, whining and shaking like a live wire. He bobs his head and Sherlock shrieks in delight, curling his toes, thumping John on the back with his heel.

"John, John, fuck-" He babbles, head thrown back and still kicking his legs out. There's no composure left in him and John thinks with a shudder 'I did that'.

He pushes a hand up To Sherlock's torso, nails raking over the skin there, teasing the nipples between his fingers, hearing Sherlock choke and sob with lust. When Sherlock's eyes open they're wide and thoughtless, nothing working behind them, dedications have become JohnJohnJohnfucknow. He's lasted longer than John would've at seventeen.

And while it feels so good he looks up and thinks 'sicksicksick' and wants it to end, wants it never to stop because Sherlock's wailing, his desperate little noises are making John crazy, and if he doesn't stop himself they'll be fucking on the mattress in no time God help him. He kneads Sherlock's slit with fervour, with passion and that's practically it.

"I can't-" Sherlock hisses, high and tight as he throws his head back for one last time and administers a clinical kick to John's back before blowing his load in two or three sulphurous spurts. He holds his breath for most of his orgasm and inhales great gulps of air, eyes closed, head resting against the headboard, wearied. There's a flush all over his face, and he looks so young and human.

And filthy. John can't bear to look at him for how young he is, how much he wants that. It's shocking. They remain there, silent for a few minutes,getting their respective breaths back before John gets up to leave. Sherlock catches his arm, deep set frown lines.

"You can't just-" But John can't meet his face without blushing, feeling terrible and lustful all at once.

"It's fine," He says, and shuts the door behind him, locks the bathroom door and sighs, resting his head against the wall. His mind is buzzing with these sick and strange images of Sherlock like there's never been before. Christ, all of those noises and faces and little groans will haunt John until he's good and dead, and while he wants it like that, wants to memorize Sherlock's body and throat and all, he feels 's become something vile and venal and wrong.

And what's even worse is how much John liked it, how much his body has responded. Of course, there's no other option besides fixing himself up, Sherlock bursting through his mind, naked in the kitchen coming from the shower, warm and glowing like an earth-treading star.

After, he sits up, breathless and tries to keep his head clear. It's over, anyway, and he should try to forget. Try to think of it as an exchange. Sherlock told him a story, a dream, a secret all under this diamond sky behind his eyelids. And while John does have some standards, because he didn't fuck Sherlock (as he sometimes thinks about, wonders about alone in the bathroom), he had to give Sherlock something in return.

Well, the devil's in the details and there's no use thinking it over, because John's sure (certain as he has eyes) that its over and done. He makes his way into the sitting room seeking breakfast, he cannot hope to operate properly on an empty stomach and needs to get rid of the taste of Sherlock before it drives him to do something thoughtless.

The train of thought crashes explodes and all the passengers are killed when he finds Sherlock sprawled out on the sofa lazily, a cigarette dangling from his lips as Sherlock smiles his simian smile. And John just stops, he can't think but to look, look until he forgets to blink and his eyes feel molten.

"Feeling better already?" John asks even though his voice is unsettled and his heart is crushed between two enormous lungs because he's practically holding his breath. Before being fascinating and beautiful and absolutely endless, Sherlock is sick and he needs rest.

"I'm fine, John." Sherlock says, lies and John knows it. He continues towards the kitchen.

"I'm making breakfast. You should get some rest." It's not meant in jest, John wants the best for Sherlock. He says it so innocently, inoffensively but it's less than best, it's not what Sherlock wants to hear. The boy comes to stand, defiant and untouchable, goes to John with an idea stuck between his teeth.

"You mean we're not-" Dips his head, drops his gaze and leans in, stirring John up. He's just acting, faking his feelings because he wants. It's the same every time, and John refuses to be played, owned by his affections. "-I thought we were going to-" And John looses it.

"Go to bed, Sherlock. What we did was bad enough." He rubs his eyes with the heel of his hands. It hurts, everything hurts. "You don't know what you want." The air is salty enough, just ready, perfect conditions for shouting.

"I'll be eighteen in a week!" He hisses. "I've known what I want for a long time. I want-" But John doesn't want to listen to it, he's too weary for another battle, given too much to take anymore.

"We can talk about it then." John spits. And he means it, deep and true. He'll be held to it, eventually. 


	10. test the waters

In a fit of youthful rage, Sherlock ups and leaves.

Of course, it's grander and more severe and he doesn't just sulk on the sofa but packs and bag. Heads off to the great white of Belarus, and doesn't turn his head at the gate of the terminal, doesn't look sad or bereft as he departs. John watches from a distance, safe. They part on sour terms, and it's all John can do to pray he comes back safely, if he comes back at all.

All in all, he's only gone for a day or two, but it's enough to be crowned the king of all tantrums, and even Mycroft voices his concern (though, not to Sherlock). Yes, neither have fully recovered, because John's still sick and pale grief, and Sherlock still wants it, more than he can say.

On the first night, John gets a call at about three in the morning. The phone calls him from the bedside cabinet, and he grimaces, rolling over, clinging to the walls of the darkness. It's early, Christ, he feels as if he's been awake since the mid-70's even if he's just woken, even if he's just woken up.

In the end, he succumbs and lies on his back, eyes finding the sheer, strident light of the mobile phone. "Hullo?" He mumbles, weary, in no mood to be woken, no mood to be toyed with. It's too late for that, he's answered the phone, and he can't well hang up. Not on the likes of Sherlock Holmes.

"John," And Crucified Christ, even through the weak, saltwater landline, that voice makes John feel cold, a rivulet of ice forming on the back of his neck. Trickling down his spine. Suddenly, the hour becomes forgotten, irrelevant, buried beneath a landslide of lust and shame. John could have told Sherlock what he wanted from the off, what he needed for a while. But not forever.

"It's three in the morning." He protests, uselessly. That never stops Sherlock. The boy is driven, knows just what he wants and how to get it. The line cracks, but John can hear him breathing.

"Don't be dull." Sherlock says, commands with his tone. And every time, John submits. The boy might ask for a kidney and John will crawl to fetch a scalpel. "It's eight here in Belarus,"

"Wonderful," He paws at his eyes and sits, because there's more to it than at that, Sherlock's incorrigible and infuriating and extravagant, there's always something more. On that, John hesitates to speak, loves to hear Sherlock talk. He finds himself useless in their conversations, because like Lestrade, he can't say anything, but only encourage Sherlock to go on. He wonders if Mycroft is 's far too silent, and then Sherlock breaks it, a deep rumble, torn from his soul. There's a crease of vulnerability before he irons it out. "Did you mean what you said?" John's said many things, he's too tired to play the game. Sherlock sounds a little out of breath, panting, wheezing. Perhaps ill. There's a shuffling of fabric.

"I'm sorry?" The worst kind of idiot needs repetition. The scowl is nearly audible.

"I turn eighteen on Friday." And john's fingers star to itch, he gets this terrible heat spread throughout him, and just a hint of guilt, but shame is impotent, unsatisfactory, it's not Sherlock. It's not all the things he could do after Friday. The gasping on the other end is far too loud.

"Are we still on?" Sherlock rasps, lungs empty, on-fire, and John's got to wonder if he's out chasing a criminal late into the Russian evening or if he's-he's-...the though is cut off by Sherlock's gasp opening out into a cry, one that burns John's ears. He's heard it before, knows that face that goes with it, pink and creased in delight.

"John," It comes right from his stomach, ripped and deeper, darker, gruffer than anything before. "Fuck, you want me." John's hands begin to quiver, and he doesn't have the blood to blush, and instead keeps his hands on the phone, above his waist, out of trouble. The panting is ridiculously quick, comes in quicker as he gets closer and closer to finishing. The slick, wet noise become more clear.

There's an evil hiss on the other end, Sherlock's trying to stave off his orgasm. "God, John, are we on?" He cries out, voice tight, close. His heart thrums, throbs through his voice. "Do you want to fuck me?" And John's thought about it, he can't stop thinking about bringing him off again and again, against the wall, on the table, blowing him in the armchair. His own virgin Sherlock fantasy.

The noise sherlock makes as he climaxes is hauntingly, painfully beautiful, and John pictures a thousand different versions of Sherlock, but he knows it'll never be the real thing. They have to be on for Friday, because john's done with all this shame, this distance, and cloak and dagger. He's sick of picturing Sherlock, imagining him when he can have him, good and decent, at eighteen.

"I'll see you tomorrow," Sherlock says, when he's about done and John's wide awake, never felt less tired at such an hour. John starts feeling uneasy then, and it doesn't settle like it should. They end the call and now they're on good terms, now they're on for Friday, God help John, the devil is going to roll out the red carpet for arrives back late the next day. He brings the cold of Belarus with him, brings into back in the evening, the waxy kind that coats the bright indigo sky with pinks and violets. Frost fastens itself to the ground, the edge of the windows, and John looks out, more anxious than apprehensive. Can t help but wonder, and by Sherlock s invincible winter his love is made afraid.

He paces the length of the sitting room, not a habit, but a display of his fear, his humanity. Many scenarios play out in his mind, a thousand different versions of Sherlock Holmes, each but a shade, each but the best he can do to recreate the madness and the genius. But none of them have been mastered properly, and they do nought but instil fear in him. How eager they d both been, only to have the fire at his feet turn frosty.

John can only hope Sherlock is just as fickle.

He s embarrassed, sort of, to have to throw a spanner in the works. Out of everything, Sherlock is keen and mature and lusty and all these awful attributes, all these sins he s committing so prematurely. John feels pathetic to fear the world as he does, to know so little. Nothing holds a roman candle to Sherlock, and nothing can.

A little black cab streaks up against the pavement and shudders to a stop around half an hour later. John spies it from the window, still paralysed by promises he didn t know if he was keeping. It wasn t Friday, that was the thing. There were whole days between Sherlock s eighteenth, days where he could get his act together, step up his game. (He s not sure if he wants to, really deep down deserves to.)

Sherlock steps out and assumes his full height, and he looks positively consumptive, but not in a weak way. No, Sherlock stands proud like a hawk, with his eyes fizzling and sizzling, sizzling and fizzling. He s thinking, the gears grinding, working effortlessly away. The cold of Belarus is draped over him like a jacket, and bound like a scarf. Christ, just seeing him is enough to make John look in wonder and want and fear. He s so conflicted he himself feels sick, dizzy. Weightless.

He pays the cabbie and moves, floats like there are flowers at his feet and laurels in his hair to the door. Knocks twice, a clean cutting sound which runs right through John. The greeting at the door echoes, Mrs. Hudson's gentle cordialities, Sherlock's voice, no longer broken a bad reception but a strong, baritone chord. The things it could do to any man.

Steps follow, two-at-a-time, leaping up the stairs like some gazelle, all legs and grace, kingly and fantastic. John turns to face the doorway, and just in time to. He thinks- no, he really believes that in another life Sherlock did have laurels in his hair and flowers at his feet.

Seventeen years, he's been treading the earth, an earth that does nought at all to deserve such a specimen. Such a short time, John thinks, because he's known so much longer, and he wants so much. The boy in the doorway wears a completely blank expression. His is not of consequence of purpose. Sherlock's just there, and he just is. John doesn't want to question it.

They're so silent for so long, an eternity of unshared thoughts and John cast his mind back, looked for those early earning signs, first signs of trouble but there were none. Perhaps at that moment there's nothing to be said.

The waxy evening slides into a dark indigo night and Sherlock might be mighty and unconquered but he's tired, really and honest, like a child woken in the back of the car, unaware of where they are and sometimes who they are. Sherlock yawns like a ferret and burrows deep into John's duvet, waits there, unconscious.

For that evening, John sleeps on the sofa. But anger, Sherlock's skin makes him sick in the night, nauseous, nauseous, nauseous.

The next day John gets up early and walks around Russell Square Gardens. He winds away time peacefully, away from the squabbles of Lestrade in one corner, Sherlock in the middle, Mycroft in the other side. It's everyone, everything. The world still spins on the axis of Sherlock Holmes, who can't be copied, is impossible to imitate, whose vanity will trick him, cause him to stumble into darkness and iniquity, and John will do anything to keep him safe, even if it means keeping him 's just as vain, he's gladder than anything that the Belarus was (presumable) a waste of time, because the hours apart dragged themselves, shambled across the midspace. Times were so boring, things were so bloodless, lifeless, without purpose. Maybe it isn't love or besottment, maybe John is just as arrogant, keeps Sherlock there for his own devices.

But, then, why does his heart feel so bad when Sherlock smokes and fights, why does his chest swell with pride when Sherlock explains an observation?

Truthfully, he stays out of the flat for a while because of the bold sticky note he'd left on the fridge, the one with all the gall in the world scribbled over it, defacing the crispness of the paper. The one that reads 'we're off, i''l get milk, John', randomly capitalized, crude. /he wonders if Sherlock will even find it, read it.

He's a good little soldier like that, choosing his battles, deciding when to fight. John never got to choose, and he was a glum sort of hero, sped up the line where he was supposed to die. But he does muster up the courage, finds it in him to face another war zone and that's what it is. Inside Baker Street was a vision of hell.

Don't fret, it's Lucifer's domain.

A few shots are fired when he's at the foot of the stairs, and that's what get's John's heart hammering away, throbbing through his ribs, crushed, panicked. He races up the stairs, lave the cold and inertia of Belarus with them and reaches the door ready, because it's Sherlock, and he's glass-winged and precious.

But no, there's really nothing and the cold catches up with Sherlock firing his gun, his gun into the wall with absolute disregard, with this haughtiness and imperiousness. He's not happy, not at all and it colder than Minsk, colder than the ice in his eyes. The sight is stapled to him.

"What the hell are you doing?" He demands, catching Sherlock's eye, getting his attention. The boy is indignant.

"Bored." That word means so many things from Sherlock, it's so cryptic coming from him and John's sick of trying to decipher his jargon.

"What?" There needs to be more.

"Bored!" And the boy flops to standing and fires again, and then again, before casting the weapon away, apparently unsatisfied with the results and tears his mind away, as if it wouldn't do to dwell on his last act of vandalism. John takes the gun gladly, putting the safety on, putting his mind at ease somewhat, but not entirely.

"Don't know what's got into the criminal classes, good job I'm not one of them." Sherlock stands in all of his perfection, of his unappreciated beauty and youth as John puts the gun away, half-listening, half-caring. He's just glad the shooting has stopped. Straightens, looks up.

"So you take it out on the wall," But really, he's saying 'so you take it out on us'. Sherlock is stroking his handiwork, the garish of yellow spray-paint on hideous wallpaper. Such pride in his touch.

"Meh," He grumbled, "The wall had it coming," And there he falls, weightless, gentle onto his back. The blue silk flicks up as he falls, like an ocean, but Sherlock's not drowning, he's got his head above the water.

"How about that russian case?" He sheds his jacket, sits down. IT doesn't bring out Sherlock's brightness or brilliance, he still looks like a child, and sulks like one.

"Belarus, open and shut domestic murder, not worth my time," Sherlock's toes wriggle.

"Ah, shame," John goes to the kitchen, to the fridge where the note is gone, and something's certainly gone with it. He doesn't know it yet, how could he?

In those final, terrible days, nobody knew. And then it happened. 


	11. a genesis

The day starts with John in a terrible mood. He feels like Sherlock: torn between killing himself and everyone around him.

The night before had been this blur of lights, of this dismal wallpaper at Baker Street, of the dusty air tat made him feel like an old man when he breathed in. Sherlock had been acidic and sharp, left burns where John had been holding him. No, the wait was painful for the both of them. The anticipation built up and became misguided, turned to anger and frustration. The thing is, John's the one making them wait, and it's the one time Sherlock is justified to be angry.

As always, it ends in the disaster that is sleeping at Sarah's, begging for a place to sleep. John's always been sociable, and he knows all about what type she is. For John dated her, took her out and had a blade pointed at her. That ended fast, because his heart wasn't it in (because Sherlock wasn't in it). Sarah claims that they're friends. But she's the type who has John as a friend because she can't have him as a boyfriend. They're close because it has potential.

John doesn't think so. He's so fixated on the invincibility of Sherlock Holmes as a whole, he sort of doesn't notice. Doesn't have to. And spends the night on the sofa, laying back and thinking about a thousand different versions of 'him'. He can't help but wonder after his mind has wandered, what Sherlock would be like to fuck. If he'd talk, babble nonstop or if he'd just stop, completely. Really, he likes the idea of being able to shut Sherlock down, quiet him in a single motion.

There's a pain in him, the shoulder and throughout. Makes it more difficult to sleep, stretched out on the sofa, an ugly sort of blue. And all night he thinks how it can't hold a candle to Sherlock's blue, a real, deep sort of blue that you can drown in, can get lost in just by looking. No even the indigo of the sky is that blue.

And then it's morning, another disappointing shade of blue, where there's so much potential, he's seen it at it's best. The pain has turned to a stiffness, an unwillingness to move about and comply with the rest of the waking world. It's all quiet, the best, thoughtful, pregnant with profoundness sort when Sarah comes in, and she really is beautiful.

That's John's kind of woman and his kind of coffee. Pale and sugary sweet, five shots of Novocaine to the brain -hold the poison, please. And he always picks these sugar-sweet girls who look at him all innocent and say "I only need-" But it's not her, it's never her, and it leaves John cringing uselessly, why aren't they as sweet as they seem? Why can't the taste of Sherlock leave his lips or his coffee?

"Morning," She says, and he replies with the same. "See," She points to the stiffness and inertia John displays when he moves. "Told you, you should've gone with the lilo." Then she goes to fuss with a pillow besides John, take a seat upon the arm and simper to him, lean near and she's fantastic, really she is. But she's not invincible and cold and calculating. Her kindness finds his face in a boring light.

"No, no. It's fine, I slept fine." And really, he didn't. There were dreams, still soured, haunted by the ghost of a past he'd rather forget but the memories have faded, he's got new and better ones. Yes, he slept fine, but he slept alone. "It's very kind of you." Sarah smiles like she doesn't care, but John knows what's behind every little glance, far too centred on forgiveness to be real.

"Maybe next time I'll let you-" She turns on the television, and John s grateful not to have to meet her eyes on that.

"What about the time after that?" And John's not leading her on, not saying yes with his eyes, he's asking. Needs to know if she's safe to depend upon, or is after someone to make her 'that woman'. And he cant, she doesn't operate in his life right now. Sherlock is the one that John is fixated with, writes about with the genius of fiction. Sarah smiles, but there is something perfect and broken about her now. Like she knows, but it doesn't stop her from wanting.

John's been there.

"So, d'you want some breakfast?" Sarah puts down the remote and brushes her lap, as if she's about to get up.

"Love some." He's half-starved from leaving the flat in such a rush, but he can't eat with Sherlock watching him, wanting him. He can't eat knowing there's a head in the fridge.

"Well, you'd better make it yourself, because I'm going to have a shower." And that's Sarah gone, sold on the idea of having John there. He's sat up, in no mood to be just anything, he's hungry and stiff and tired, and there's this enormous weight on his chest. Sherlock's on his tongue, in his head and he needs a meal. He buttons his shirt in silence when he hears it.

'There's been a massive explosion in central London. As yet there are no reports of any casualties but Police are unable to say if there is any suspicion of terrorist involvement. '

He's long since up by the end of that, jacket in hand, appetite gone, and his heart is squeezed to bursting, all he can hear in his pulse is 'Sherl-ockSherl-ockSherl-ock' and his head is going '?'. The fear floods him, there's a necklace of sweat draped over his shoulders, and smoke seems to cloud his eyes, they become steamy and Christ, crucified Christ, Sherlock needs to be okay, his thought shall be that Sherlock will never be dead who laughed so lately in that quiet place.

"Sarah!" He calls. "Sarah! Sorry, I've gotta run." And run he does, like the rabbit because now the farmer's got a shotgun, now the farmer has gone bunny bopping and there's Sherlock, standing above the ground, prince of a thousand enemies, staring down the farmer and laughing. John can't watch.

The wreckage makes his breath catch, because the bricks and debris and rubble, all just powder now where once a home to somebody, once something and mortality mocks him, shows him how easy it is for Death to gobble you up. John can't cheat forever, and he's a wanted man when he's at Sherlock's right hand.

"Sherlock," He says as he runs up the stairs he'd ran down with such gusto before. The irony stings, like a bullet in the back. "Sherlock?" john's heart is squeezed in this hot, choking fist. He looks about wildly and stops, because the air is filled with two warm notes, ringing parallel to eachother. Sherlock's there, unscathed, fine. He doesn't look at John, who wants to melt next to Sherlock, wrap him up and keep him locked away from Death forever. It will do nothing to pale his eyes.

"John," He says it like it's a rumour of some other man, like he hasn't been trying to get John into bed for the last few months. Mycroft sits across from him, head of dark ginger turning, his eyes drawing up John's entire being,, probably counting the seams.

"I saw it on the telly, you okay?" He's aware his breathing it louder, proclaiming his worry, saying all that he wont. Both of them read it easily in hints.

"What?" Sherlock turns his head sideways for a second. "Oh,yeah. Fine. Gas leak, apparently," And goes back to playing with the violin, throwing, casting off John's worry like it's cumbersome, like it's shameful to carry on his shoulders. Playing it off cool to Mycroft, this snotty, twenty-something know-it-all whose probably never even held a gun, heard one rumble. No, Mycroft Holmes is far too sophisticated to have snot in his nose. "I can't." The siblings lock eyes, and John's glad he's not in this one.

"Can't?"

"Stuff I've gone on's just too big, I can't spare the time." All that stuff include's sharing a bad with John, calling him in the middle of a wank when he's in Belarus, sulking, starving, lounging about in his dressing gown and shooting the wall.

"Never mind your usual trivia." And shit, Mycroft knows, John bets he's heard that bloody phonecall, has it recorded for extortion opportunities in the future. Mycroft sound far too comfortable not to have some kind of leverage. He's made no threat so far. "This is of national importance."

And Sherlock, who sees that he knows, doesn't panic, keeps on fiddling with that bloody violin an strums it, half-listening, half-caring. He's no shame for lusting after John like he does. "How's the diet?" That makes John nearly wail with laughter.

"Fine." And then Mycroft, always brilliant as the situation dictates, always thinking he can talk like this to people much older and wiser. "Perhaps you can get through to him. John." John doesn't want to be included, he likes it better when he'd ignored. "I'm afraid my brother can be very intransigent."

"If you're so keen," Sherlock hedges,"Why don't you investigate it?"

"No, I can't possibly be away from the office for any length of time, what with the Korean elections," And all proud of himself, all assured of his own importance of and influence Mycroft allows himself this disgusting smile. How proud. "Well, you don't need to know about that, do you?" The worst kind of sibling is a smug one.

"Besides," He continues, as if a script is being typed into his mouth. Every word is dictated perfectly, even like a television presenter. "A case like this requires-" His face turns dark, and uglier "Legwork." That elicits an even uglier sound from Sherlock's violin. He looks up, slightly flustered and annoyed. Slightly more human.

"How is Sarah, John? How was the lilo?" He corners him with his eyes, and the disinterest of the glare is stapled to him. John realizes that Sherlock's playing it cool, he doesn't want Mycroft to know how much, ho terribly he wants. Lest it be taken away. Mycroft takes out his watch, equally nonplussed.

"Sofa, Sherlock, it was the sofa." and John goes to ask 'how did you get to be so up yourself' when he refrains, calmly.

"Ah, yes, of course." Sherlock joins in, like he'd known all along. The silence never lasts for long, and John wants to go back to Sarah's and let her think they'll knock out one in the supply cupboard at work and never speak of it again.

"Sherlock's business seems to be booming since you and he became... pals."That's only confirmation that Mycroft knows, sees Sherlock's want and John's hesitance and the place smells of acid and unresolved-sexual-tension. The goading doesn't stop there. "What's he like to live with? Hellish, I imagine."

"I'm never bored." And he makes Sherlock proud, makes him smile for the first time in forever. It doesn't last, though. How could it?

The games had only just begun. 


	12. reported missing

There are five pips. Five games. Tasks, trials, each shaking the earth, each bringing with it the wrath and brilliance of a boy, a child in their wake.

It starts with the shoes. 'His shoes' Sherlock mutters, and in the back of the taxi he purses his lips and thinks back. John can see it on his face, mapped out in the fault lines across the skin there that the memories are not like old friends, and he waits, in the silence, until Sherlock emerges from his trance.

'Where I began'. And it's strange to think. Sherlock's so enormous, so clever, and endless. John always assumed he didn't have a beginning. And yet, ten years ago John was quite unchanged. It's strange to think of a seven-year-old Sherlock, a prodigy, a mastermind, who everyone passed off. Everything gets passed off eventually: sense, looks, youth.

It obviously wasn't a good time, and John fades into looking out of the window. If there's one thing worse than passing Sherlock off, then it's pitying him.

That night Sherlock examines in the kitchen, doors closed, totally alone. His focus is so intense. When he had wanted John, he'd thought of nothing else, not food nor rest nor preservation. Had made a call from Minsk that stemmed from his lust. If John were a lesser man, he'd be jealous. Everybody who knows Sherlock Holmes knows that his work comes first.

Eventually, the silence, the lust and guilt and shame and worry for a desperate stranger strapped to semtex gets to him, and John slides open a door, peeks his head through and sighs. There's Sherlock, standing tall, coatless and in all of his glory. Of all the months they've known eachother it's only then that John sees it: Sherlock's shirt. The way it strains, tight and ill-fitting. Sewn for a fifteen-year-old.

"How can I help?" But so engrossed, so focused on this pair of shoes, shoes over John, Sherlock doesn't seem to care. It's not as if he needs help. "I want to help." John says. he does, he really does want to help. But not with the shoes, or the past. No more work.

John walks towards Sherlock, hands on the boys hips, and goes to kiss him, had missed the touch of Sherlock's white hands, has missed being able to smell tobacco on his hands, taste it on his lips. And for a second, for a snatch of moments, Sherlock succumbs and lets his eyes slip close, stops thinking, focusing, calculating, screaming inside his head.

But it doesn't last, and Sherlock pulls away, turns back to his first and most pure love, the one that doesn't corrupt him. At this point in time he supposes one is easier to come by.

"Friday." He mutters, and John goes to argue, take it back but Sherlock's far too smug and clever and witty for that. "I suppose nobody likes to be kept waiting." The deep purple of the shirt is stark against Sherlock's pretty, frail wrists and John wonders what it would look like against the dark of the carpet, or up against these spidery thighs.

And they're so close, they have so many opportunities. All of them are wasted and John will regret it, tear himself up over it. Nobody likes to be kept waiting, and John would wait alot longer than he'd anticipate.

The second is Janus Cars. The picture. God, that case. Between Sherlock arriving they'd chase eachother into the bathroom to hold eachother against the tile, to crash their lips together, let their hands roam. Underneath that ridiculous cool and beneath that snowy skin are warm insides, and John wants to know every inch of him.

The call, the work comes and suddenly Sherlock doesn't look up, doesn't notice when John is in the room. He doesn't even care about the stranger in a London crowd. Whoever it is, playing these games- whoever Moriarty turns out to be, he's certainly got Sherlock's attention . It's terrifying, because Sherlock is already indulged to excess. The cases keep him alive, and he interacts, has a slim shot at normalcy, with John. This destroys it.

Sherlock's sees everything, and he knows how restless John is getting, it reminds of calling in the cold of a Belarus night. He wants John to take him, thinks about it and has to laugh. He's heard John's campaign to seem noble, to abstain. And all the other piteous platitudes of pathetic misery. He laughs and laughs, John will come again, ask for more, sooner.

And bless his heart, John is so simple! Easy to mess with, confused, delude. between gathering scraps at the crime scene, between tormenting a 'grieving widow' Sherlock grabs John fiercely and they kiss, Christ, he goes in with such gusto and the rest of the Yard staff fall silent, gasp and watch John make these little noises, oh, Sherlock, no we musn't-

After Sherlock walks like he's seen nothing, done nothing. And John just stands there, all eyes are ice. Watching him. It's satisfying, but Sherlock can't deny that there's lust rising in his chest. He might be difficult, incorrigible at times, mostly, often, always. But he's not a Hypocrite. Friday it is. Friday it must be.

And even Sherlock doesn't know. How could he?

The third, they stay shy of any other public displays, and the fourth they stay apart. The nights are long and hard, and John sleeps on the sofa because Sherlock's breathing keeps him awake. Anger, his skin makes John sick in the night , nauseous, nauseous, nauseous. In fact, despite his antics earlier, Sherlock pities John for all of his want and orders them apart for reasons unsaid. John goes off just fine, investigates a little. He pleases Mycroft, settles him, behind Sherlock's knowing (so he thinks).

"It's going...yeah, it's going great." And John only says that because he can't explain to Mycroft elaborately how he plans to fuck Sherlock that Friday night after an amazing dinner and hours of desperate languid foreplay. No, that's a shade too dark and he settles for ambiguity. All the while Mycroft rubs his jaw and smiles like he's got a secret.

"I may be frank with you, John, mayn't I?" As worrying as that it, John is compelled to nod. He never expects it from Mycroft, but it comes all the same. "Please, and I mean this in all earnest-" He waits a beat for the punchline. "-make love to Sherlock sometime soon. I fear he needs it."

It will haunt him until he dies. Only Mycroft would order that to happen. And only Mycroft would use the phrase 'make love'. It's nearly enough to put John off the whole thing entirely.

Nearly.

By Thursday evening, John can't be near Sherlock, this boy who's on the verge of turning eighteen, who is so nearly accessible, so nearly touchable. He has to go to Sarah's. Not that he wants her, but he wants to get away, needs to. That taste of his lips will be enough to drive him insane.

Sherlock promises to get the milk. And the beans. John takes a good long look at him, breathes in the smell and essence of Sherlock, wants to remember him like this. A good thing to.

Two hours later and John's at his side again. Across the chlorine floor there are vicious red dots, this little smile hidden in burgundy eyes. The playful Irish thing must only be twenty-at most. He's smaller than Sherlock and something inside him is worn.g Like all his strings have been broken, or his vessel has taken too much damage and has cracked, split open. At his feet, there lays a bomb. And Sherlock, with sniper targets stapled to him, shoots his gun.

The trigger grates. John closes his eyes and prays. To nobody. There's a definite crunch of bullet, but nothing happens. Above him, Sherlock stares wildly, in disbelief, at the vest that lies there, a single bullet embedded. The Irishman laughs and laughs.

"Oh, Sherlock," He scorns, and Sherlock growls, fired the gun again and again. Deafening shots whip through the waters. John sees the gun empty, sees it fall to the floor. They're dead. They must be. John wants to reach out and touch Sherlock, confirm he's still there but something about him is gone. Sherlock has cheated death too many times to start keeping rules.

The Irishman is cackling now, high-pitched and manic. Another slice catches John across the ears, and it's not Sherlock, couldn't be. The laughter surrounds them, eats them up, swallows them whole. Sherlock falls onto the ground, and his eyes are open.

They remain on John, still watching, just watching. 


	13. isn't it beautiful?

It's not a bullet, John thinks, he hopes and prays and wishes. And even if it is, he's breathing, and there's no blood, nothing seeping out of Sherlock. He's still there, and he's still watching. Slowly, as if shocked by his own consciousness, sherlock blinks, and John misses his eyes.

Across the chlorinated floor, the irishman smiles, licks his lips something awful, like he wants to sink his teeth into Sherlock. He plans to, needs to. He just might. John gets on his feet shakily, and leans forward to here Sherlock lies, wordlessly, uselessly.

"Not any further, Johnny-boy." And it's serious, the smiles turns darker and uglier as John turns his head towards the twenty-something, the psychopath. There's no word from Sherlock. The water sloshes against the pool edge, clear and crystalline. John can picture it murky with blood. He turns his eyes back to Sherlock's body. "Now, now, Doctor Watson. We don't want to make any gambles with your pretty little detective."

Sherlock looks sleepy. He doesn't ever move, just his lungs filling, his breaths screaming that he's scared and confused. That he was certain of death. All eyes watch him, the great Sherlock Holmes who has been rendered silent.

The water beats wildly against the tile, shattering, thumping like a pulse. The blue is so cold, and death's hand might reach out, might have already caught Sherlock, even before he'd have fallen. Only there's no red, no cloudy crimson or coppertone crawling along the plastic, drowning in the chlorine. He inhales! -he exhales! -and John is deaf to all else but those desperate breaths, deaf to the cackling of the irishman. It's loud and sheer but John's gone from that realm, feet on the precipice, the edge of land and earth because Sherlock's alive. Slowly, as if shocked by his own consciousness, Sherlock blinks, and John misses his eyes.

John stands and the laughter dies away. "Now, now Johnny-boy. Not another ste-ep," Across the chlorinated floor, the irishman smiles, licks his lips something awful, like he wants to sink his teeth into Sherlock. He plans to, needs to. He just might. A beating dot fixes itself to Sherlock's back, fastens itself where Sherlock heart would be. He inhales, he exhales. And the red turns on John. But nothing happens.

The distance between them seems insurmountable and he's so young, bright little bones will break before they bend and neither of them are enough. John is bright as any, knows where he stands and 'that's not a bullet, Sherlock's not dying he's-' Inhales, Exhales. "Oh, Doctor Watson. We don't want to make any gambles with your pretty little detective."

Sherlock looks sleepy. He doesn't ever move, just his lungs filling, his breaths screaming that he's scared and confused. The blue shimmers and the red throbs through a newsprint curtain, is making coffins from candied hearts. John gets to his feet and an taste a wave of blood, iron, over his tongue.

The snake-charmer's face turns ugly. Dissent is not tolerated. Sherlock's not moving and it's Friday, they've waiting and waited but now John's watching him breathe and that is somehow enough. The serpent see's that taste on his tongue and look in his eyes. The red pulsates on his heart angrily and the irishman walks over, comes towards where Sherlock lies, motionless, mute, useless. The footsteps in John's head are too slow and too steady and he wonders what he should do. There's nought else but to-

John drops in to whisper to Sherlock. he never gets to saying anything though, not even a whisper because something more vicious slices through the air and a sensation of pain explodes, burns white-hot down his arm. He's felt like this before and the memory mocks him until a shade of a man lays howling on the plastic, painting the tile with his coppertone. For it's definitely a bullet, and John's upper arm bleeds liberally.

Sherlock's eyes are on him, still so sleepy. He tries to mumble something, to fling these meaningless noises at John but it's too late, it's not enough. Impossibly close, the serpent begins to sing-song, eyes on Sherlock "Here comes the candle to light you to bed, here comes the chopper-" A warning shot lands but centimetres from John. "-To chop off your head," And Jim stops, leans down and cocks his head at John, this strange little smile on his face.

John shuffles back, expects him to say something. But there's only silence, there's only him staples to the floor by that impossibly furious red dot. Sherlock knows something, and is still trying to mumble, but Jim seems to take no heed. The boy is tossed over one shoulder like a burlap sack, and everything stays this unearthly shade of quiet. Sherlock manages a gritty, choked "john." but it's too late, and now they both know, both sense it and nothing can be done. Sherlock wants to have seen it coming, want to have anything in his time of need. He will not leave empty-handed, and that's set in stone.

Jim grins to himself. "Fight back, Sherlock." He says, licking his lips, tugging hungrily at the boy's waistband. And Sherlock does nothing. Can't do anything but lay uselessly, eyes still on John, always on him and still doing nought to his attacker, his rapist. And John can't even think to say that word aloud, can't think of sherlock as vulnerable, a victim,, because he's something fierce and tall and smart.

John catches as the clothes are torn from him, exposing snowy outsides that he's never fully touches, and bits of skin he's still yet to kiss. Jim's anything but gentle, bites and scratches and savours savagely he's taunting John for what he's never had. And it's then, as Sherlock keeps his eyes on John, vacant, thoughtless, useless, that John knows it in his heart what's been so wrong all this time. Because through the pain in his arm and the shivering blue and the angry, thrumming red Sherlock Holmes isn't this strange and special thing, he isn't an enigma or a tortured soul, he isn't mad as a hatter or thin as a dime or anything whimsical and wonderful and the like. He's a boy, Sherlock Holmes is but a child to the earth and he's getting devoured.

Jim kisses him on the mouth, and it's too hard to be a kiss. Fists balled up, John screams, and he inhales and he screams again because Sherlock, it;'s all my fault, please forgive me, I never meant for this to happen, you're just a child, you're only-

And in between inhalations he screams 'I'm so sorry' and it's not enough, he begins to crawls, a trail of blood from his arm but it's useless and the red turns furious, successive streaks of bullets streak the air but it's none more deadly than the tears that come feeling for Sherlock's face. His expression does not change. Tears fall, misty, steamy and molten, drip from his eyes like blood and he's given up, just watching John, and Jim laughs, he tears into Sherlock and breaks him, destroys every bit of calm because though limp Sherlock's face creases and he draws in an enormous, ragged breath that sounds like dying.

Everything else fades away, and Sherlock is crying in earnest now, he's given up the pretence of bravery and adulthood and callousness, he's sobbing because Jim's taken something irreplaceable from him, laughs and bites and fucks and is making topcoats of his misery. Rain has begun to shatter outside like a piano being stomped on, the sounds every bit as cracked and broken as the seen before him. his blood melts away from him and Sherlock cried, his strings are tugged, snapped, broken. His vessel has become so cracked that it's split open and he's drowning.

This isn't happening, though. John thinks how clever Sherlock is. He's good, he's really good. He's not here and he's not suffering,he's smiling and waiting at home, insulting the forensic department and making eyes at Lestrade and bickering with his brother he's anywhere but here and now, he's anything but suffering, he's dying, giving up and he's just a child!

inhales- Sherlock, I'm sorry, Sherlock, I never -exhales. How long do they have left/ How many breaths before the red explodes, or the blue swallows them up?

Sherlock's cast on his side and he's naked, exposed to all of it, face ruddy and rouge. He lays there wordless and used, unwanted, despoiled. Why speak not of them who went under? John tastes the blood as Jim sings, cackles, fingers on his hips, those hips. Kisses him off.

Make your decision. Whom did Jim punish? 


	14. bait and switch

Down the dark-grey corridors they sing their way to the brighter lights, the ones left on by sad ghosts, left behind. They line the place, faces grimly gay, a gravitas painting solemnity, no time for smiles, no heart, or great courage. John sees them, all stuck with fault lines and wreath, as men's are, dead and gone.

Dull strangers watch, with tears for someone else's grave, or worse, a smile but for news, like a rumour of some other reality. Sorry to miss them from misery, it seems. Flickers of white wink to the strangers, like a hushed conversation between two angels. Wrong, hushed up. Those words were not John's, he did not hear to which way they would send.

But still they watch, turning down the dark-grey that swallows them, more amorous than the bloodless lights that come feeling for faces, seducing John into violent furies that are not his own, that do not belong. And there, he lies, the heartless angel with his wings torn from him like a helpless butterfly. Eyes closed, not wrongs or furies that spill from them but silence.

John's love is made afraid again.

There are shouts and whispers, between the whitewashed walls and sheets of linen. Sherlock's blood and sweat run like ink on those papery sheets, writing the story of his own death, of his own misery but utters not a word. There is no comfort in the well-known pleasures, for the smell of fabric has turned to the damp of graves. And even Sherlock's dark curls look like the uncut hair of graves, too, mourning the loss of something -thin in substance as air, but John knows it, he has seen glimpses of it.

He has seen it die.

Will it return, John wonders? Crawling like misery, creeping back like a spectre, up half-known roads to the crumpled sheets at Baker Street, wildly or quietly? Piping the way to glory or the grave? And John, poor John, who ran with it, will kiss no others. Nor yet there if they mock what women meant, who give him flowers. Flowers that sit by the window and wither and die, and John cannot look at the white of the petals, snowier than Sherlock's skin but rougher.

Is this how it will be, he wonders? A book, read in reverse, so he understands less as the pages turn? And God, that silence, that silence that hides the furies, the wrongs hushed-up so well like cruelty. A tool devised by Sherlock in his finite state, to make sinking stones fly. No more of those serious vanities, no cold fires that keep John watching, so alive, skin so excited and mysterious.

But anger, sick in the night with these memories and he cried, how he cried I'm sorry, if only I had known I would had given you everything, if only, if only I-

They wrench the boy from John's watchful eyes. And he floats away like his body is weightless, but John fights them, he tries to fight them but he's weak from another battle and the red in his shoulder stings, it betrays him and he claws at his skin. It's a civil war, John's fighting himself and there's only ever going to be one winner, there's only ever going to be one outcome and he sinks to his knees sobbing hysterically, scratching at his bloody skin and just sobbing, no time for breathing in air that tastes colder because it's gone from him, there's none.

Lestrade presents himself with a hand on John's shoulder. "I'm sorry," he says, and how could he be, Christ, he doesn't know. He thinks he has endured horrors but anger, but fury upon malice John wants to tear him down, he wants to burn the whole of London down because he's so useless. Because Sherlock had watches him vacantly, and he had been able to do nothing."He's okay," But he's not, and John is still sobbing.

"It's not-" He hisses, and turns on them. It's not okay. It will never be okay, and Sherlock, God, he's alone and he's afraid, stop taking about him like he's evidence, he's just a body, because he's not, Sherlock Holmes is not an enigma or a genius, he's not special or wonderful, he's a boy and he's alone and frightened, he's too young and he needs John, he needs him like oxygen but they don't listen. they will never understand. They come with flowers like a memento mori.

One by one all day, it seems, They arrive with sympathies that serve as food for guns and shells, these piteous platitudes of pain, John's thought is never that Sherlock was, or wasn't, he is, and he will always be. Worst of all is Mycroft, twenty-something, isn't he? Twenty-something and usually so stoic, usually so cold and cold and removed, and it tears his insides up. John watches him with sad eyes as he loses himself in the labyrinth, of life and death and want and suffering, suffering endlessly.

He hold back his sadness, as with Sherlock and those secret wrong, as with Sherlock until he cracked, until he sobbed to himself because Jim was laughing, how he laughed and tasted the skin there, how sweet it must have tasted only to go sour in context. Paler than sky, and cold, cold like ice, laying naked on his side, still watching, eyes angry, because Sherlock will never be able to understand it.

John takes him home.

Wrapped in a paper gown and his coat, his coat that smells like Sherlock, imperiousness and arrogance simplified to something so crass. He doesn't walk like he used to, no proud strides but shuffles, nervous like the words of a stammering man. He says nothing. Worse, his eyes, oceans of sterling remain downcast and dark. John knows better than to pick at scabs, he sees his boy and his crooked, wasted heart still lifts in certainty that he loves Sherlock, for all that's worth, he loves the boy of barely eighteen, and he would wait a lifetime to be there by his side again.

Those who have come with words say nothing, as if those words, so ripe with meaning have rotted and fallen away so quickly, and Lestrade knows it's not okay by the state of silence, he drops his eyes, too, and he knows he's done wrong. Other strangers to the conversation are more strange. They cry at nothing, and why? What use are tears but dehydration, but venom into a wound that never felt scarring? Mycroft just looks at him, mouth open, but no sound tumbling out. His lungs have crystallised.

Down the dark streets of nowhere, and Sherlock looks so small, he looks so tired and childlike. Leans against the window and watches the roads with an adolescent discontent. And that silence kills John, he knows better than to look or touch but Sherlock might never speak again, silence, bitterness like an imperial affliction. How will he be in a week? A day/ A year? Because if Sherlock is infinite then so are his sympathies and miseries, so are the wrongs, hushed-up that scar his hips, that have crushed hips lips in a violent kiss. So will be the memory of that snake-charmer touching and cackling and singing songs about 'his pretty little detective' and God, John nearly throws up then and there thinking about it, can feel his bile duct raging.

There were never any who envied their brokenness. In the cracked darkness outside of Baker Street, Sherlock shuffles pathetically as John pays the fare, goes to the door to let them in, and the boy says nothing. He avoids John completely, as if touching will send him right back, helpless, so still, so drowsy but awake enough to know, God, awake enough to suffer, and he'll suffer every time he touches. It's unavoidable.

The air is cold and still. Has finished making cups of their blood and is forgiving, is kind. will renew it's love in due course, but lets all pass. The gravel is wet and cold. Sherlock's feet, his pale feet are blistered, form where he's so used to walking on air only to find broken glass that acts like diamonds. And all of this walking takes him nowhere, blinded of his senses, grounded by this immense fear of everything, where before he'd been so fearless. The boy sways. He's drowsy.

John tells him to rest. There is no kissing, there's no time. And Sherlock sways his way to bed, to a grave where he sleeps lightly, but John will wrench him from death by any means necessary because he's stupid and foolish and crooked enough to love this boy, this misguided ghost, too far from home, too far from the light and it will burn his skin if he;s exposed to it for long enough.

"Goodnight," John says, quietly, but Sherlock remains silent. Perhaps he will forever. normally, John holds his hand when Sherlock is angry. Pretends to see the apparitions Sherlock sees when he's drugged and scared. And should the devil land on his back Sherlock is strong enough to shake him off. But this time? It's anybody's guess, and that ambiguity is scary, it's not clear-cut enough, and God, John needs certainty, stability. he needs to wake up and know Sherlock might still think of him, once or twice. Pity him in all of his love and squalor. This freedom does not make him feel contained.

There's too much on Sherlock's sleeves. And it's too much to do with Jim.

Hours later, John drags his weary spirit into the bedroom and lingers by the door-frame, looking at Sherlock, so tiny and alone in this sea of sinfully red covers, curled up like he's fighting demons in his sleep. Remembers his ailing heart and his criminal eyes. so what if Sherlock is still in love? There's nothing to be done. Never daring to touch him, less the hallucination of peace fade, he lays next to Sherlock. There are four layers between them: john's clothes-the covers-Sherlock's coat-Sherlock's gown.

He's never felt further away. 


End file.
